Long Overdue Dreams Review 6.1.08

I apologize this took so long to finishâ€¦I was slammed at work from the day I returned and didnâ€™t have the energy until now to complete it...

All in all, things went pretty smoothly and we had an amazing time, so on that note, here goesâ€¦

Flights â€“ Alaska Air â€“ C We flew out of SFO and the flight was delayed 4.5 hours due to mechanical difficulties with the aircraft coming in from Vancouver. Once it finally arrived, they did get us on as quickly as possible and they did have space to hang my dress. The flight home was on time and uneventful.

Rooms at Dreams - A We have a timeshare at Dreams (Casa Dorado) which is a one bedroom and it never disappoints. They have remodeled the rooms and I really liked the updates. Most of our guests stayed in junior suites with king beds and loved it. Everyone said the rooms were spacious, clean and had great views of the pool and ocean. They also raved about the service and how well run the hotel was.

Food at Dreams â€“ B We were all-inclusive for the last three days of our stay and the food was for the most part was good. Oceana Terrace was my favorite. Himitsu restaurant was a huge disappointment. The food was mediocre at best (maybe an off night) and our waiter was drunk and got annoyed when we wouldnâ€™t order another bottle of sake. He said he couldnâ€™t do another shot with us unless we got another bottle and I was thinking since he forgot to take my order when I asked for a wine list, he should probably stick with water! Breakfasts at the El Patio were always good.

Reception Food - A The dinner was really, really good. The asaragus soup, rack of lamb and filet were amazing...the lobster that came with the filet was like rubber. The appetizers (I'm told) were really good too.

Staff at Panchos â€“ A+ The staff was very accommodating and on the ball. I was really impressed with the effort they put in to make sure all of us were taken care of. Our glasses were never empty and they constantly asked if we needed anything and if so, it was brought to us right away.

Wedding Coordinator - Katie at Weddings in Paradise â€“ A I chose to use an outside coordinator since I had begun emailing Yesica about a year out and nothing had been done at the 6 month point. I started to panic and decided an outside coordinator was going to be in my best interest. Very pricey, but well worth it in my opinion since Katie was on the ball from day 1. She answered all my questions immediately and was helpful with suggestions and very knowledgeable of things that worked and things that didnâ€™t. The only downside to WIP was that they wouldnâ€™t budge on company policy if you had already placed a deposit on somethingâ€¦my case being Panchos restaurant for the Rehearsal dinner. I chose Panchos because Katie said there was no fee for her to coordinate it, but if I chose another place, Iâ€™d be on my own. Well, I did some research and the reviews were good, so I went for it. But then I started reading some not so great reviews more often than not and asked Katie if I could change restaurants without losing our deposit and the answer was no, no, no. It was two months out and I thought the company could have been more flexible about this, but they wouldnâ€™t budge. Not a huge deal, but worth mentioning. Another problem we had was with the vendor Katie hired to play our wedding music screwed up and didnâ€™t play any of the processional music we chose â€“ he did get the recessional song right, but I was disappointed and would recommend a walk thru prior to your ceremony to make sure the correct songs get played.

Dreams Resort Wedding Coordinator- Yesica Garcia - B Yesica is a very sweet lady, but I felt she was overwhelmed with all of the weddings going on and I didnâ€™t feel confident that all of the details would be taken care of. She met Katie and me for a walk thru Thursday prior to the wedding and she still had questions about things that I thought were settled. She did meet us prior to leaving to go over the bill and everything was exactly as she quoted, so I was please about that.

Vendors:

The Flower Cart - A+ I was extremely pleased with the way all of the flowers turned out, especially my bouquet! The colors were exactly as I wanted and I was very sad that I had to leave them there. I did manage to sneak the memorial flowers home which made wish I had put my bouquet in the suitcase as well!

Sweet Dreams â€“ A+ The cake and mini desserts were amazing. I was nervous about the cake since we didnâ€™t do a tasting, but it was awesome, super moist and very flavorful and they accommodated two flavors in both layers rasberry mouse and lemon curd - yummy!

Gilda Badillo Photography â€“ A+ Gilda was amazing. She showed up on time and took charge from the get go (in a very nice way, not a control freakish way). She knows her stuff and we got the pictures back in less than three weeks. I was very impressed with her.

We do a lot of activities off property so if you are interested in things to do, towns to see or restaurants, please let me know.

Congratulations, I'm glad everything turned out well. We didn't even bother to go to the Himitsu (sp?) restaurant when we were down this time because when we went there last September we weren't impressed either.

Thanks for the great review. You mentioned the last three days at Dreams were all inclusive...can you choose to not be all inclusive for some of your stay? Would you reccommend doing that?

We were all-inclusive the last three days because we were hotel guests as opposed to timeshare guests...our timeshare runs Monday to Monday and we can opt for all-inclusive (all or nothing though), but we like to eat off property, so we usually don't get it. Since we extended our stay 3 days beyond the timeshare period, we paid hotel rates for our room that included AI. I do like the idea of paying for AI on chosen days, but I have yet to find a resort that will do this!